CSA Week 5
The Fabulous Fruit and Totally Tomatoes CSAs start this week! Woo Hoo! We don’t have tons of tomatoes yet, but were afraid if we did not get going, well, we just have no idea what this growing season is doing, let’s leave it at that.
Things you MAY have in your box/bag this week: cucumbers, summer squash, chard or kale or lettuce, peppers? blueberries, peaches? The corn may have reached that gap I mentioned was going to happen – remember all the heat pushed the ripening at one time.
News flash: it’s been pretty miserable with rain here and that means many things grind to a halt. Not only are fruits not ripening, but blossoms may not be getting pollinated or setting fruit, and we cannot get onto the fields to prep or plant…and we have TONS of plants building up over the past weeks that need to be set in.
To recap the cucumber situation as printed last week: With all the varieties of cucumbers we grow, it’s not that outrageous to wonder what’s what. After all, the squashes and cukes are all cucurbits and share many characteristics! Naturally we grow the regular slicing cucumber, but we also grow the Kirby or pickling cuke, as well as Persian, which are very smooth skinned and almost seedless, and Lemon, which are round, yellow, tennis-ball-lookin’ things. Those are the ones people sometimes think are squash, or baby melons…also cucurbits!!! In the top 10 questions we get at markets: do the lemon cucumbers taste like lemons? Nope.
Recipes
What have you been up to with your CSA goodies? Please share any recipes or ideas with me to share with everyone in this letter and/or post your creations on Instagram or FB and tag @stillmansfarm and #cookingwithstillmans
Should we do a weekly lottery for Stilman’s CSA member food posts like we did in the Spring CSA? We randomly chose a winner from posts tagging us and gave little prize like a jar of sauce or pickles or whatever. Yes, I think we should do it! We found posts on Instagram worked better for this that FB.
We’ve been eating a lot of sliced radishes and cucumbers in vinegar, a little oil, s&p…it’s kind of addicting.
Cool Cucumber Soup – Taste of Home
- 1 pound cucumbers, peeled, seeded and sliced
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1-1/2 cups fat-free plain yogurt
- 1 green onion, coarsely chopped
- 1 garlic clove, minced
- 4-1/2 teaspoons snipped fresh dill
- Additional chopped green onion and snipped fresh dill
In a colander set over a bowl, toss cucumbers with salt. Let stand for 30 minutes. Squeeze and pat dry.
From member Jordan: Hi! I thought this recipe might be useful to anyone looking to use up some summer squash in a delicious way. I have been using an InstantPot for a lot of my cooking because it doesn’t heat up my kitchen on hot days.
Zucchini & Summer Squash Soup
- 1 Tablespoon unsalted butter
- 2 Tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
- 1 small onion, chopped
- 1 garlic clove, sliced
- Kosher salt
- Freshly ground black pepper
- 1 ½ pounds any combination of zucchini and summer squash (2-3 large), halved and sliced ¼ inch thick
- 2/3 cup vegetable stock/low sodium broth
- 1 ½ cups water
Stovetop directions:
- In a large saucepan, melt the butter in the olive oil. Add the onion and garlic, season with salt and pepper and cook over moderately low heat, stirring frequently, until softened, 7 to 8 minutes. Add the zucchini and cook, stirring frequently, until softened, about 10 minutes. Add the stock and 1 ½ cups of water and bring to a simmer; cook until the zucchini is very soft, about 10 minutes.
- Working in 2 batches, puree the soup in a blender until it’s silky-smooth. Return the soup to the saucepan and season with salt and pepper. Alternatively, blend in the pot with a stick blender and season to taste with salt and pepper.
InstantPot directions:
- Place butter, olive oil, chopped onion, chopped garlic clove, slice zucchini, vegetable stock, and water into the instant pot. Cook on high/manual for 3 minutes and quick release the steam.
- Puree the soup with a stick blender or in batches in a tabletop blender until silky smooth and return to the pot. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
Serve it either hot or chilled, with suggested garnishes of drizzled olive oil, extra julienned zucchini, or a spoon of crème fraiche/sour cream.
Cucumber Drink
Member Alicia found this recipe at www.chowhound.com.
- 1 1/4 cups peeled, seeded, roughly chopped cucumbers 2 c cold water
- 1 c crushed ice 1/3 cup lime juice
- 1/2 cup sugar (I used simple syrup, which worked well, too) pinch salt, if desired
Place all ingredients in blender and blend well. Can be enjoyed as is, or filter through a fine sieve if you want a beverage without the pulp.
*I’m ready for this with a splash of gin, soda and squeeze of lime!
Eat more salad 🙂
Farm Mud
Good grief stop the water already! Maybe for a week or ten days?
The peppers are starting to come in and a few tomatoes. I’d like to be posting next week that there are lots of tomatoes, along with news about the standing water in between the rows being gone and taht we managed to plant out some of the backlog 😉
We’d love for you to come out to the New Braintree farm to harvest your own! It is great when members experience the harvest for themselves and it is part of understanding the labor involved with our local food supply. If you have children, it is a timeless lesson to have them pick a head of lettuce, pull a beet, pick berries, eat an ear of corn raw, standing in the field…. Not only does one understand how something grows, but one gains perspective on the labor costs of harvest. Actually, it is a perspective many adults are missing too – so if you’ve never picked a tomato or bean, put that on your CSA bucket list. Check out our directions and other things to do page
We are 25 minutes from the Sturbridge exit on the Pike, so you can pop in at Old Sturbridge Village and we are not far from the Quabbin Reservoir, you can plan a hike after you are done hiking here 🙂
All teh wildlife I have seen this week has been birds of some sort, turtles or tree frogs – oh wait! the fireflies are abundant and a pretty sight at night. As with prior years, we have Chimney Swifts in our chimney (duh) and periodically one can hear the wing-beats of the parents descend to the next and the young chirping away to get fed. Then the parents leave and all is quiet again. I managed to record the sounds last year, but now I cannot find the recording, sigh. The Barn Swallows are feeding their second nestlings and they are so cool!
Eat well,
Geneviève Stillman
Chimney Swift (Wikipedia)
